All About Pocket Knives

I am starting reconstruction project refurbishing old worn out Case and Schrade folders. I aquired some new old USA Schrade blade blanks that I want to grind down to replace broken and damaged blade. My question is when in the production process did Schrade do blade tempering. My hope is that is was done prior to the tang being stamped. Pictures attached of the blanks. Any help appreciated.
EVM

Welcome evm156.
I can't help you with your question, but I think that blade is stainless steel if that makes a difference to you.
Actually I think they temper a blade after stamping.
Some one with some real knowledge will come along and give you better answers.
Good luck with your project.

Thanks Joe, I haven't received the blades yet, but after your comment, they do look link stainless. I believe Schrade USA Old Timers would have come with Carbon (if my information is correct) and Uncle Henry's had stainless. If they do need to be tempered, that brings on a whole new thought process about my project. That's not something I have every done, nor have the equipment to do (unless I can heat'em up in a fireplace in a coal bed) LOL.
Anyway thanks for response.
EVM

I have a bunch of those blades also. I found out that Camillus and Schrade both blanked their blades, stamp their blades, hardened them and then heat-treated their blades, all prior to grinding them.
The reason for this is that a blade that the thinner a blade is ground the more it has a tendency to warp. Something custom knife makers deal with time, however in a manufacturing scale if you have 10% warpage of the blades you have lost a lot of money.
Phil Gibbs, who used to work for Camillus, told me the blades are ground on large grinding machines that have a coolant/lubricant that is pumped over the blade all the time they are being ground. He said the machines Camillus used were made in Germany. The constant bath coolant/lubricant and the slow speed of the stones prevents the blade from heating up and ruining the heat treatment of the blade. Phil also said this is the only method that makes sense in a high production manufacturing environment. If you grind the blades before you harden and heat treat them your percentage of loss will be unacceptably high. Therefore the blades are hardened, heat-treated and then ground.

I don’t know how a guy would grind one of those blades that are already hardened. I’m not a blade smith, so I’m no expert on the heat treating process. Perhaps there is a way to anneal the blade back to a softer state where it could be ground on a belt sander and then re-hardened then heat-treated again. If you had a wet grinder that was large enough to do a hollow grind, depending on the size the blade probably a 10 inch stone or larger, you could grind them slowly that way. If you use a belt sander I would think you would have to quench after every pass on the belt. A slow and tedious process and I imagine a rather expensive given the price of good belts.

I have picked up a number of those unground blanks over the years from various sources, I must have 15 pounds of them, but they never seemed worth the effort to me especially not when you can buy blades on eBay already ground for less than the price of one good 36 grit sanding belt.

After doing some research on grinding hardened steel there are some knife makers who do grind their blades after they are hardened.
They quench after every pass or two, but they apparently are successful in their efforts.
Here is one of the videos I found.
http://youtu.be/xPLCLX2Vpfo

I'd check the hardness on those, it doesn't look like they were heat treated at all, although I could be wrong. Might be at the point where they had just come off the press and got the tang stamp. Is there a nail mark on the other side?

Eric

I think Eric may be right. I see no signs of heat treat on the blade and there would be no reason to remove it prior to grinding. Any steel I have heat treated shows definite tell tale color.

Great info from Dale as always. I can see where in a large commercial scale business heat treating before grinding would make sense. Heat treat before stamping would not be very kind to the blades or stamps.

I have never heat treated a blade before grinding. Any warping from the heat treat can be straightened before tempering the blades. I do know some makers grind after heat treating but I wonder how much this effects the life of abrasive belts.

Wayne

Here is a quick pic of a few of the ones I have here.
Do you think they have been heat treated?

Thanks,
Dale

Your blades I would guess are not heat treated, looks like they were stamped out and stamped with the company's logo and number. I have made over 500 knives and this is the way I do it. Stock removal method with a 2x72 inch belt sander using different grits down to 90% of finished size, then stamp any numbers or logo in the annealed state. Then heat treat in a paragon oven, then temper to desired temp. Then I grind the final grind and polish. You cannot stamp heat treated steel, could crack and will not stamp very deep and will ruin your metal stamp. While grinding hardened steel you must have a bucket of water to keep the blade cool or else you will take the temper out of the steel blade (if it turns blue while you are grinding, you have taken all the temper out of the blade and will need to reheat treat. I hope that ,makes sense, Just trying to help out, Terry

Dale, from the looks of it the fillet blade, the 7OT, the funky one under the 7OT, the two shiny clips and the shiny sheepfoot on the right were not. The two blades under the filet knife were, as well as the two pens and the other sheepfoot on the right. The treated pens and sheepfoot also appear to have had their tangs annealed.

Eric